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Report: 800+ Immigrants Mistakenly Granted Citizenship; Trump Suggests Profiling Would Stop Terror; Trail Of Clues Leads Police To Capture Bombing Suspect; Candidates Fight For Votes In Florida. Aired 7:30-8a ET

Aired September 20, 2016 - 07:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[07:30:00] SEN. ANGUS KING (I), MAINE: Because, you know, you've got the bad guy but you've also got thousands and thousands of really good people who come into this country, you know. Everybody from Einstein to Donald Trump's ancestors, and mine and yours came in through the immigration system.

So, to shut everything down of all a sudden, I think, would be at a terrible cost to the country, not commensurate to the risk that would be allayed. That doesn't mean we relax or we stop, but to say the system's perfect -- got to be perfect before we do anything I just don't think is realistic.

ALISYN CAMEROTA, CNN ANCHOR: Senator Angus King, we always enjoy having you on NEW DAY. Thanks so much for being here.

KING: Thank you.

CAMEROTA: Chris.

CHRIS CUOMO, CNN ANCHOR: All right, so this is the discussion. What would these candidates do that's different than what's being done now and would it make you more safe? Donald Trump says he can do that. It is wrong what's going on now and he can make it better. How does he plan to do it and are his plans constitutional? We're going to ask a Trump supporter in Congress, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:35:10] CUOMO: Terror works on the campaign trail. We're seeing both candidates talk about it. Donald Trump is making big promises, saying that terror attacks will "go away" under his presidency. Trump seizing on bombings to bolster his call for tougher immigration laws and, what he calls, extreme vetting. What does that mean? What would this plan look like?

Let's bring in a Trump supporter, Wisconsin Congressman Sean Duffy. It's great to have you, Congressman, as always.

REP. SEAN DUFFY (R), WISCONSIN: Good to see you.

CUOMO: So you look at this situation. People are afraid, no question about it. The fear is not backed up by the actual threat. Is that something that you accept as a premise? DUFFY: Well, I don't because I think the threat is real. I mean, whether you go back to 9/11 or you see these constant attacks month after month throughout the year, I think people feel it's real. And we used to look, again, to New York or L.A. or Orlando or Boston. It happens in big cities.

But when it goes to St. Cloud, Minnesota, places in Middle America not far from where I live,I think you strike fear in all of Americans and American moms that this can come home to any small town mall throughout the country. So, I think it's -- it feels very real for Americans.

CUOMO: Feels -- statistically, not such a big threat. Intelligence officials, as you well know --

DUFFY: Yes.

CUOMO: -- put it very low on their list of priorities, but let's stick with the fear because it's real. And if you want to play to it in politics, that's fine, but you have to do something about it. So, Trump says, I will. This will go away under a Trump presidency. So you get to the obvious, how? Extreme vetting -- I'm going to -- extreme vetting. What does that mean, extreme vetting?

DUFFY: So, let's get to that in one second. But first, I think, you want someone to fight for security and safety and I would just look to the president. And the fact that you're releasing prisoners from Gitmo -- very dangerous al Qaeda members. He's opening the doors and sending people out. The fact that we spent, Chris, $1.7 billion in cash to Iran, the lead sponsor of terror in the world.

And then you look, yesterday, to the really unemotional response from the president to these attacks. I think people don't feel -- and back to that point -- they don't feel like they have a government, a president and a leader that's going to fight to keep them safe.

Now, I think that this gets to be tough because you've kind of unleashed this movement with ISIS and al Qaeda that's inspiring people around the world. I think Trump is right when he says this makes sense that we take a pause. Why do we have to let all of these people into the country when we can't effectively vet them?

I think my constituents -- they would say hey listen, Sean, I want you to fight for me. Fight for America. Look out for us first. And if you can keep us safe and you can bring people in who want to live the American dream, good on you because we're a country of immigrants. But if you can't guarantee me that your duty is, first, to me, not someone from Syria.

CUOMO: You will never be able to guarantee any vetting from Ireland, from Italy, let alone --

DUFFY: No, no, we're not saying Ireland. Come on now.

CUOMO: You will never be able to guarantee it, we both know that. What I'm saying is we have to separate the hype from the actual facts on the ground at this point. You know the money went back to Iran because it was Iran's money. It was part of the deal. It wasn't a gift.

DUFFY: No, no, no, no, no, no.

CUOMO: But even that's a distraction, though, Sean. I'm talking about how we -- he said I can stop this here.

DUFFY: Yes.

CUOMO: I'll do it with extreme vetting. The vetting that we do for Syrian refugees is better than any vetting we do for any other part of the system, and the proof is in the pudding. This Skittles comment that Donald, Jr. made -- if you want to put up his comment, you can. He said if I gave you a handful of Skittles and I told you that three of them were going to kill you, would you eat that handful of Skittles?

That's a powerful metaphor. The problem is it's also B.S. The numbers aren't anything like that. The risk is like one in over three billion you would -- "The Washington Post" wrote a piece about this. You would need two Olympic-sized swimming pools filled with Skittles to find three bad ones in it and that being the right ratio.

You're dehumanizing these refugees. That's not what America's about. And your extreme vetting means what at the end of the day? How would you make it better than now except keeping everyone out, which is not what this country's about?

DUFFY: But when you look at hot regions of the world and you look at the failures -- I mean, so first of all, we're saying we want to bring in refugees. But we've had migrants -- we had two migrants that did the attacks this weekend. So you had someone from Afghanistan in New York and someone from Somalia in Minnesota. So I think people see the connection of bringing folks in from hot regions.

I think it makes sense to take a pause and the question becomes if I can't guarantee that you're going to want to live the American dream and you're not going to hurt my citizens, why do I let you in? I mean, I think that that's an American conversation you need to have.

CUOMO: But I'm saying that your system works really, really well, Sean, statistically. But the amount of crime that you get out of these -- if you wanted to create a rule like that to keep us safe, anyone who makes under $40,000 should --

DUFFY: No, no, no, no.

CUOMO: -- be taken out of the country --

DUFFY: You -- no, no --

CUOMO: -- because they commit most of the crimes.

DUFFY: But, look --

CUOMO: You wouldn't do that. It would be ridiculous.

DUFFY: But look at hot regions. I mean, if you're looking at Syria and Afghanistan, and even Somalia, you have -- this is a radicalized region.

[07:40:00] CUOMO: True.

DUFFY: Why bring people in from that region?

CUOMO: Because when you follow through who you let in and what they do in this country --

DUFFY: But why are we letting them in?

CUOMO: -- they commit less crime than everybody else. That's why.

DUFFY: But when they commit crimes they're very dangerous. They're taking out --

CUOMO: No, they're often garden --

DUFFY: But there have been people --

CUOMO: Some, but less than the rest of the population, so why villainize them?

DUFFY: But go back to this point of America wants you to keep them safe.

CUOMO: Yes.

DUFFY: They're your first responsibility. The responsibility isn't to anyone in Syria, the responsibility is to your citizens.

CUOMO: Right.

DUFFY: I think that's what Trump -- hold on --

CUOMO: Many of them are Syrians, by the way.

DUFFY: I am going to be a president for the United States of America, not a global president. Back to Iran, we owed them $400 million. The president gave them $1.3 billion in interest -- which it wasn't clear that we owed them -- and he gave it in cash. That's a problem.

We would usually send the money to a European bank and let them use it to buy legitimate things, whether it's grain or a truck or a plane. They got it in cash and we have prohibited cash payments to Iran. They went around the law. And when they have cash, that's the underworld of -- whether it's drugs and guns, the mob --

CUOMO: But it was a deal that was agreed to by both sides.

DUFFY: It's a crappy deal. I mean, they're the least --

CUOMO: Plenty of Republicans were afraid -- or were in favor of the deal.

DUFFY: No, they weren't. We thought it was a --

CUOMO: It got voted on.

DUFFY: No, no, no, no, no. This is -- so there's -- the Iran deal is separate from the cash payments that the president made. The cash payment was a separate deal. There was an exchange for the hostages. We won't call it a ransom, they might disagree with me on that. But it's a lot of money --

CUOMO: The administration says that it's not true. It was negotiated decades ago about an arms deal.

DUFFY: There was no --

CUOMO: Not about the hostages.

DUFFY: No, it was a 400 -- there was $400 million that was owed that was being negotiated. But the payment was made in cash and the fact is you can use that to fund terrorism, and they do, and you can use it to buy technology that can be used for -- whether it's for missiles or for a nuclear program.

People say, Mr. President, who are you looking out for? Why are you giving cash to the lead sponsor of terror, which makes us the lead funder of terror? Why are you releasing people from Gitmo? And why are we bringing people in when we can't verify that they're going to keep us safe? And if you can't, the bottom line is we shouldn't bring them in until we can.

CUOMO: Sean Duffy, thank you for making the case. Appreciate it, as always.

DUFFY: Thank you.

CUOMO: Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK, Chris. The swift capture of the New York and New Jersey bombing suspect provided a treasure trove of clues and the capture was a result of those clues, in part. They were left at the scene. We'll talk about the role of surveillance cameras and cell phone notifications, and just good old-fashioned police work, next.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[07:46:00] CAMEROTA: Police capturing the bombing suspect only four hours after releasing his name and photo to the public. Investigators using evidence left behind at the bombing sites, as well as surveillance video and a new phone notification system to nab their suspect.

So let's discuss this with former Boston police commissioner Ed Davis. He was in charge of the investigation into the Boston Marathon bombing. Commissioner Davis, thanks so much for being here.

ED DAVIS, FORMER COMMISSIONER, BOSTON POLICE DEPARTMENT: Thank you, Alisyn, good morning.

CAMEROTA: Good morning. This series of bombings is being likened, on many levels, to what happened in Boston. The type of explosives that were used as well as some of the locations. This one also was at the scene in New Jersey of a foot race much like the Boston Marathon. So what are the similarities that you see in this investigation?

DAVIS: Well, clearly, the motivation appears to be very similar. There was foreign travel just before these incidents occurred. The type of weapon was very similar -- pressure cooker bombs.

There was a different level of sophistication in these devices, though. They had a trigger that was connected to a cellular phone and that's a step up. Also, the explosive material was much more dangerous to deal with and more sophisticated than the black powder that we saw in this attack. So I think that they're learning and we're learning.

CAMEROTA: Yes. Much like in Boston, everyone is lauding the police work. They made such short order of this guy from the time that they figured out who he was. We were just showing there all of the different surveillance video of how this guy was caught.

There were 8,000 -- there are 8,000, basically, surveillance cameras in New York. He was caught on several of them so that allowed them to -- along with his fingerprints on some of the bombs -- figure out very quickly who he was. Is that progress since Boston or did you rely on all of those surveillance videos? Did you have as much to work with in Boston?

DAVIS: Quite frankly, we did not. We had some traffic cameras but they were not recording back at that time. New York City is well- known for its sophisticated network of cameras and also the retention of their data. They haveinformation going back many years so they can go back and, retrospectively, look at an incident and develop information.

I was with Commissioner O'Neill on Friday night, 24 hours before this happened. A tremendously well-respected and experienced police officer, as well as people like John Miller, who were in the terrorist unit. These guys did an unbelievable job. And I contacted them yesterday, a little upset that they'd broke our record. They broke it in half. They did a -- they were really, really fast with this one.

CAMEROTA: Absolutely because it could -- it took you guys four hours and -- I mean, four days of an intense manhunt to get your guy in Boston. And they just -- here -- I mean, you're right, they cut it in half. But, you know, they've learned a lot from all of you. But also, Commissioner, I just want to say that with all of the high-tech developments that we've had there was also a real low-tech tool that they were able to use, and that was good old-fashioned television.

You know, we put the guy's photo on T.V., as did all sorts of news outlets, and a bar owner saw his face. He was watching CNN, he saw the guy's face, and then he saw him across the street at his bar. And I have to tell you have gratifying it is to know that T.V., with all the eyes -- the millions of eyes watching -- it still works.

DAVIS: You know, Alisyn, it's really the epitome of community policing. Police were formed around this idea that the public are the police and the police are the public. And this plays out in 2016 in the pursuit of a very dangerous bomber. We would not have found him. With all of the resources that we had here in Boston, it was a man that went out for a cigarette in his backyard that actually located the suspect. So we live this every day. The community is central to what we do.

[07:50:00] CAMEROTA: Absolutely. If you see something, say something. That really worked here and it worked there in Boston, as well. Hats off to all of the police here in New York, as well as Boston. Commissioner Ed Davis, thanks so much for being here.

DAVIS: Thank you, Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: Let's get to Chris.

CUOMO: The time is ticking down, the days to Election Day growing shorter. The campaigns now narrowing their focus to try and get the best bang for their buck out of the voters. What does that mean? Battleground states -- specifically, Florida. What is each campaign doing there? You need to know.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

CUOMO: Can you believe it? Forty-nine days until Election Day and this presidential race continues to tighten. Many battleground states now locked in a dead heat, including the state of Florida. That's where the latest "New York Times" poll shows Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump in a virtual tie. Take a look at it for yourself.

We have CNNs Boris Sanchez, live in Orlando, talking to voters in the Sunshine State about the choices. Boris, what did you learn?

[07:55:00] BORIS SANCHEZ, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Hey, good morning, Chris. As we well know, the road to the White House often leads through Florida. The candidates certainly know that so they've been spending a lot of money and time here in the Sunshine State. Donald Trump had an event near Naples yesterday. Hillary Clinton has one tomorrow here in Orlando. And though they both covet Florida voters their approaches to getting them are somewhat different.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

SANCHEZ: A state that could make all the difference on the electoral map come election night is also one of the hardest to predict. Florida and its 29 electoral votes, yet again, a toss-up in 2016 with voters divided on the issues and the candidates.

JOAN ESSSENBERG, TRUMP SUPPORTER: Donald Trump was not my first, second, or third choice, but he is now.

SANDRA CALIXTO, ANTI-TRUMP: Trump is a racist. He's discriminated against people with disability and I have a son that has a disability. And for me, he's cuckoo.

SANCHEZ: There are 4.6 million registered Democrats in Florida and about 4.4 million registered Republicans. A razor-thin difference when you consider Florida's nearly three million unaffiliated voters. So both campaigns are throwing money at the middle, spending roughly $48 million on television ads since the start of the general election, according to ad-tracking firm, Kantar Media.

(T.V. AD): In Hillary Clinton's America, the system stays rigged against Americans.

SANCHEZ: Hillary Clinton and her super PACs have pummeled Donald Trump, outspending the Republican four times over.

(T.V. AD) DAVID LETTERMAN, FORMER HOST, NBCs "LATE NIGHT WITH DAVID LETTERMAN": Your ties are made in China.

SANCHEZ: Since early June, Clinton's team has spent $38.7 million on T.V. in the Sunshine State to Trump's $9.2 million. Despite the imbalance in spending, recent polls show Clinton and Trump are still in a tight race.

SUSAN MACMANUS, POLITICAL SCIENCE PROFESSOR, USF: Flip a coin. It's now all about turnout.

SANCHEZ: Really?

MACMANUS: It's so close and it has been for some time. In Florida's last three elections -- its two governors races and the 2012 presidential -- the victor only won by one percent.

SANCHEZ: There are a few areas that really illustrate why Florida is such a battleground better than the central part of the state. You've got retirement communities like The Villages, which happens to be older, less diverse, and a Trump stronghold.

And only about 45 miles away you have the polar opposite, Orlando. It's much younger, much more ethnically diverse, and it skews toward Hillary Clinton.

REBECCA: Hi, this is Rebecca calling from the Florida Democratic Party. How are you?

SANCHEZ: To find an edge in central Florida, home to nearly 40 percent of the state population, Clinton is investing heavily in an expanded ground game.

SIMONE WARD, STATE DIRECTOR, HILLARY FOR AMERICA: They've done an operation over several months that just can't be matched. It is the ground game that will make the difference in a state that is one percent.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (SPEAKING FOREIGN LANGUAGE).

SANCHEZ: The Clinton camp is courting more than a million Puerto Ricans living in Florida, about half of them in the Orlando area. WARD: She was talking to them about the things that matter to them about economic stability, offering jobs.

SANCHEZ: The Trump campaign has been slow to build a ground game in Florida but thanks to a major boost from the RNC officials say they expect to have several dozen offices up and running soon, along with more than 200 people on staff and several thousand volunteers.

SUSAN WILES, STATE DIRECTOR, DONALD TRUMP CAMPAIGN: We do have our offices open. There are 60 between the Republican National Committee, the Republican Party of Florida, the other candidates, and us, so there are plenty of places for volunteers to gather.

GOV. MIKE PENCE (R-IN), VICE PRESIDENTIAL NOMINEE: America can be strong, American can stand tall again.

SANCHEZ: While Mike Pence energized Trump's base at The Villages on Saturday, state officials say their campaign is not focused on any specific demographic group. Their strategy is simply to get their candidates and message in front of as many Floridians as they can.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We believe that if you meet him, you support him and you like him.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

SANCHEZ: Now, overseas ballots go out next week and early voting in person kicks off just about a month from now. It's something that both campaigns want voters to take advantage of. A spokesperson for the Clinton campaign here in Florida telling me they really want to target millennials with early voting, letting those that haven't voted before know that they have many options before Election Day -- Chris and Alisyn.

CAMEROTA: OK, Boris, thanks so much for that. All this week we'll be looking at these key battleground states, so tomorrow we're going to gauge how Pennsylvania voters are feeling about the race.

All right, we're following a lot of developments -- new developments this morning about the bombings in New York and New Jersey, so let's get right to them.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(Gunshots)

HARINDER BAINS, BAR OWNER: I realized right away that OK, this is the guy. And then in 15, 20 seconds everything break loose.

JIM SCUITTO, CNN CHIEF NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: The prime suspect in the New York and New Jersey bombings is in custody.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We are looking to see if this man has been operating alone.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He was hiding in plain sight and you would have never known it.

BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: We do not, and never will, give in to fear.

DONALD TRUMP (R), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: He will be taken care of by some of the best doctors in the world and he'll probably even have room service.

GOV. ANDREW CUOMO (D), NEW YORK: Welcome to America. You have a right to counsel and you have a right to hospitalization. That is our system.

HILLARY CLINTON (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: This is a sobering reminder that we need steady leadership in a dangerous world.